Shimmer Polish - Swatches Part II

Happy Monday! 

It's only happy because I have school off today. ;)

Buuuuuut it's also happy because I have the second part of my swatches of Shimmer Polish.

You can view the first post here. (I replaced some of the photos so I would suggest checking it out!)

I'm just going to jump right in with the first polish which is Natalie which is described as a dusty Blue, Gold and Copper glitter polish. I think that's a perfect description. Before I put this polish on I wasn't entirely sold. But once I put it on, I loved it. Shown below is 3 coats plus top coat.

Born Pretty Matte Polish Review

Hello Everyone! 

I have another Born Pretty review for you today. 

This time I tried Barbaric (B) Girl Matte Nail Polishes seen below.

F is for Floral!

Continuing on with the Alphabet Nail Art Challenge....

F is for Floral!

Happy 4th of July!

To be 100% honest, there is no holiday I hate doing nails for more than the fourth of July. I'm not really sure why, I think I just hate the colors.  

Anyhow, for Memorial Day, Mely did these amazing nails and posted on Instagram. I fell in love and knew I wanted to try this.

Here's what I came up with:

Tahitian Beach Nail Art

Not too long ago, one of the lovely ladies I follow on instagram posted a picture of her Tahitian beach inspired nails along with the inspiration picture. 

Amazing right!? I was instantly inspired and wanted to try this design as well.

Here's my rendition: 

Clearly mine aren't as good as hers but I am still very happy with how they turned out.

Side note: I kind of hate mural manicures because my fingers don't like to cooperate and have everything line up. 

Hope you liked this design! It's like having paradise at your fingertips.

Thanks for reading!

Celine

Anchor Nail Art Part II Tutorial

As you might recall, yesterday I posted these nails.

Anchor Nail Art Part II

Hello all! As some of you might recall, I did these anchor nails a while back.

Somehow they got really popular and I've seen many nails done by other people inspired by mine.

It's honestly the coolest thing ever seeing work inspired by me. 

A few weeks ago I saw this picture and it inspired me.

Dreamcatcher Tribal Nail Art

I've always wanted to do nails with dreamcatchers. I went to paint these and I had no clue what I actually wanted to do, so I kind of just went for it.

Born Pretty Striping Tape Review

Hello everyone! I have another Born Pretty review for you! 

I was sent Striping Tape to try out, so without further ado, I present you my review.

Starting with the specifics, I tried color #10 which is white. All of the colors are really nice. The white can go with pretty much anything. I also think the gold looks really elegant (even though I haven’t tried it) Each color is $1.90 or $8.90 for all 12 colors. 

The Little Mermaid

I have to say, I consider myself more of a "pattern painter" rather than a picture painter- if that makes any sense... That said, I do like to challenge myself to do cartoons/people/etc. This is one of those times. 

I really love The Little Mermaid. and I really love these nails, especially Flounder.

Don't you hate when you love a mani and all of the pictures you took turn out bad? That's what happened with these. 

p.s. ignore the spots on her shoulder in the picture above :( Why does acrylic paint do that? 

I guess that's all I have to say. I hope you like these as much as I do!

Thank you for reading. 

Celine

Lace Pictorial

This is the second installment on my whole "redoing my old pictorials" plan.

You can see the original here, although I would suggest not because it's pretty awful. So without further ado, here's the new and improved version. 

Step One:

Paint a base color. I chose China Glaze's "Flip Flop Fantasy" You can either paint the entire nail or diagonally like in the photo.

Step Two: 

Using a dotting tool (or bobby pin, pen, anything else you're comfortable making dots with) and paint/polish, diagonally place dots down the nail.

Step Three: 

Paint three (or however many fits) half circles along the dots.

Step Four:  

Repeat step 3. (haha!)

Step Five:  

Again with a dotting tool (or anything else that can make dots), place dots on the outside of the half circles. That's it! It's a pretty simple design. 

Here's a super simple photo that shows all the steps: 

Born Pretty Store Gold Chain Review

       Hi guys I'm pretty far behind on my posts, but I have another Born Pretty review for you! When I received these chains I was really excited because I've seen other artists like Sara Le use them and make them look great. 

      

         First, I did a poppy design with regular Seche Vite top coat. I really like how the chains look with only top coat, so shiny!

       I got the Gold 1.6 mm chains. I feel like this is a perfect size. As you can see on my nails, the chain isn't overpowering or ridiculously huge. I really like the gold too. On the website it says the chain is 100 cm long. That's over 3 feet if my math is correct. This amount will definitely last you a while.

       Application: So to place the pieces on my nail, I first had to cut the chain. I wasn't sure how to go about this, but in the end, just regular scissors worked. I would recommend cutting it before you paint your nails so you don't mess them up. After I painted my second coat of polish, I took the individual nail sized piece of chain and placed it on the nail with tweezers. Honestly, this part is tricky. The chain doesn't like staying flat. After I did my second design with the chains, I got the hang of it and it wasn't too difficult. If you have trouble and get polish on the chain itself, you can clean it up with a Q tip or nail brush and nail polish remover. Very simple solution!

        To keep the chains in place, I simply used top coat. You could probably use nail glue also, but honestly just top coat is enough. The chains stayed like no other 3-d nail decoration I've ever used. I didn't have any trouble with them and I actually had to go and pry them off when I wanted a new design. 

    

    

     Here's the same design with matte top coat. I did both matte and glossy to show you how they look both ways. I really love matte nails but the glossy makes the chains look really good. Either way they really make your nails look fabulous.

         
   Here's my second design. These were inspired by Katrina. She has really awesome designs so definitely check her blog out!

          Picture of the same nails in regular top coat. This is a really bad picture and I don't remember taking it but it gets the point across.

   I highly recommend these. Once you get the hang of them, they're pretty easy to use and look awesome! I got tons of compliments on both of these designs. They stay on for days ( I had the floral design on from Friday night until Monday night and even then, the chains weren't coming off on their own) with just topcoat. 

         If you order them now, they're only $2.99 - Superb deal! Even at $5.61 it's a good deal! You won't find chains this small and perfect for nails anywhere else. Not to mention free shipping too! Use my coupon code XKL91 and get 10% off! 

*This product was provided for review. All opinions are my own and are in no way influenced by anyone

Patrick Star - Enough Said.

Even though I'm turning seventeen in July, I have a soft spot for Spongebob. I watch it pretty often to be honest. That said, these nails were bound to happen. 

I also really love that meme.  Funny stuff.  

Originally was going to paint Patrick on all my nails but I think this looks better. It's not the greatest, but I do like them. 

PS ignore my ugly cut on my pinky. I pretty much had a black swan moment. - WARNING that gif is slightly graphic.

Okay I think that's it. Thank you for reading!

Celine

Summer Floral

I am beyond ready for Summer to start. These nails feel so summery and I just love them. 

Surprisingly, I'm actually happy with the pictures I took too. I think the Turquoise came out really good in the pictures. It's Essie "Where's My Chauffeur?" I was kind of regretting purchasing this color, but then this mani made me love it again.

These were actually inspired by these amazing nails.

Okay I really love these. 

Thank you for reading.

Celine

Damask

This will be a short post because I really don't have a lot to say about these nails. 

I'm VERY behind on my posting. 

oops

This was my first successful go at damask print. I remember trying to do it a while back and it was just a train wreck. 

For some reason all of the pictures I took turned out really badly. 

I'll probably redo these sometime in the future. I really like the matte top coat with it, makes it look 100x better!

Thank you for reading!

Celine

Peacock Nails Pictorial

One of the first pictorials I made was for a peacock design. Let me just say, it was really bad and dark. Actually most of the like 4 pictorials I've made are bad, so I'm going to try and redo them all. So, here is my totally new, redone peacock nail design. 

STEP ONE: 

Paint a base color. I used Essie's Navigate Her.

STEP TWO:

Use a thin brush and black paint/polish, make short strokes to create the feather. 

STEP THREE:

Again, use a thin brush. Paint short strokes with golden paint/polish. 

STEP FOUR:

Repeat step one, over the gold paint. (This step is just so the colors blend together nicely)

STEP FIVE:

Paint a small, gold oval toward the end of the feather.

STEP SIX:

Repeat step five, but with light blue paint/polish.

STEP SEVEN: 

Finally, paint a dark blue "C" shape inside the light blue.

I hope this was somewhat helpful. If you try this, let me know, I would love to see! 

Oh yeah, and here's a simplified version: 

Skulls & Bows

There's honestly nothing I love more than skulls. I'm OBSESSED. It's slightly ridiculous. That said, skulls are my go to for my nails.

I just want to mention that these were inspired by the talented Lexi Martone, hers are much better so definitely go look!  

Not a whole lot to say besides I love how these turned out. The bows are so cute!                                                                      Once again, thanks for reading. 

Celine

MARINA & THE DIAMONDS ♡

               Let me start this off by saying that I usually don't like to post personal stuff on my nail accounts but I think this is slightly relevant so here we go. On Friday night, (May 10th), I went to the Marina & The Diamonds concert. 

               I don't wanna tell a big long story so I'll just tell you the key ideas:

• There were more "hipsters" there than I've ever seen in my life. Please for the love of humanity stop that trend. (especially creepers)
• Also, I just want to point out the fact that a lot of people were wearing hearts on their cheeks, but it was definitely the wrong side. 
• Overall, the concert was amazing. Marina is so talented and fun. She puts on a great show.  
  
  Here's a picture of my mother and I before the show. (She would probably be really mad if she knew I put this up here, so don't tell her...) 
  
  So here's the exciting part. I actually met Marina. A lot of people asked me how so I'll just explain. After the concert ended, my mom and I waited outside the venue for about an hour. Marina came out and signed autographs. So without further ado, here is the picture. 
  
  
  
  She's so sweet and adorable. And look at that nail color! Love it! 
  Finally, here's where it gets relevant to my blog. I did my nails for the concert. 
  
  
  
  
  I got to show her my nails and she said she loved them. I'm about 105% my life is now complete.  So yes, that was my weekend. Easily the best weekend of my life.
  If you read through all of this, I applaud you.
  Celine